Programming Elixir

Programming Elixir is published by Pragmatic Bookshelf in October 2014. This book has 280 pages in English, ISBN-13 978-1937785581.

You want to explore functional programming, but are put off by the academic feel (tell me about monads just one more time). You know you need concurrent applications, but also know these are almost impossible to get right. Meet Elixir, a functional, concurrent language built on the rock-solid Erlang VM. Elixir’s pragmatic syntax and built-in support for metaprogramming will make you productive and keep you interested for the long haul. This book is the introduction to Elixir for experienced programmers.

Maybe you need something that’s closer to Ruby, but with a battle-proven environment that’s unrivaled for massive scalability, concurrency, distribution, and fault tolerance. Maybe the time is right for the Next Big Thing. Maybe it’s Elixir.

As a developer, you’ve probably heard that functional programming techniques help manage the complexities of today’s real-world, concurrent systems. You’re also investigating designs that help you maximize uptime and manage security.

This book is your guide to Elixir, a modern, functional, and concurrent programming language. Because Elixir runs on the Erlang VM, and uses the underlying Erlang/OTP architecture, it benefits from almost 20 years of research into high performance, highly parallel, and seriously robust applications. Elixir brings a lot that’s new: a modern, Ruby-like, extendable syntax, compile and runtime evaluation, a hygienic macro system, and more.

But, just as importantly, Elixir brings a sense of enjoyment to parallel, functional programming. Your applications become fun to work with, and the language encourages you to experiment.